


until tomorrow comes

by long_live



Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:47:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21609292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/long_live/pseuds/long_live
Summary: Mina’s breath smells like mint. It’s the oddest thing to notice, here, with a Glock 19 discarded at her feet, the ridges of what is probably Mina’s backup knife pressing into Sana’s thigh, the target still in the apartment building across the street.(Sana’s greatest regrets have nothing to do with the people who died by her hand. She finds them more in the memories of the girl she couldn't save, and the one she left behind.)
Relationships: Hirai Momo & Minatozaki Sana, Minatozaki Sana/Myoui Mina
Comments: 13
Kudos: 180





	until tomorrow comes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dubfu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dubfu/gifts).



> happy (late) birthday, becca!

**SEOUL:**

The wind is stronger on the rooftops of the city. Sana has to steady herself whenever a particularly savage gust sweeps over, even though the brunt of it is absorbed by the little brick partition she’s crouched behind. Even with the weight of the gun grounding her.

In the next building over, the target’s figure has just come into view, emerging from behind the curtains of the apartment window to shake hands with the other occupant of the room. They’ve been talking for the past forty minutes or so, but Sana’s only been here for the last three. In a moment, her job will be done.

Sana tightens her right hand on the grip of the gun. Wraps her left over it, shifts her aim a millimeter to the right. Waits. A step forward, and the target will have positioned himself perfectly in the line of fire.

(Smaller hands around her own, guiding them into place. _Satang,_ chidingly, _you’d think someone as experienced as you would know the proper way to hold a Glock._ A careful kiss pressed to the nape of her neck; her own indignant response breaking off into a gasp. Laughter muffled against her skin.)

Yes. Only a moment more. Then all Sana has to do is return to Tokyo, where it began, to find the last of them, and when that’s done, she can finally—

“Sana!”

Her finger slips off the trigger.

/

**ISTANBUL:**

In Istanbul, they’d caught up to her for the first time.

The air there was hot and stifling, the crowds in the market more so. Earlier, Sana had found herself picking up on snippets of conversation here and there off what little Turkish she remembered from language training. Couples bickering over which spices would be best for dinner that day, an elderly lady haggling down the merchant at the bread stall; in English, the odd tourist marveling over a snowglobe priced at three times its worth. Sana shouldered her way roughly through them all, intent in her pursuit.

She’d been searching for this man for eight days, and she’d gotten so close, fingers itching to draw her weapon if not for the surrounding civilians— he was only a dozen or so meters ahead, held up just as she was by the density of the crowds that day. Then he’d veered off into an alley, and Sana followed only to find him seemingly vanished.

The sound of footsteps approaching from behind had her spinning on her heel, hand darting to her gun after all, and even when she saw who it was she didn’t move it away.

“Sana,” Jeongyeon said. Her own hands were empty, but Sana was no idiot, knew that the moment she stepped out of line there would be a bullet in her leg. Jeongyeon had always been quickest to the draw. “Don’t shoot. I just want to talk.”

Sana had to laugh at that, though not cruelly, because Jeongyeon was still Jeongyeon. Jeongyeon who had been her handler on her very first solo mission and cleaned up the messes she left as a rookie with only a quick, affectionate roll of her eyes; Jeongyeon who liked to stop by the apartment without invitation to flop gracelessly on Sana’s couch and steal whatever she had made for lunch that day; Jeongyeon who now stood in the mouth of the alley opposite Sana, and it was an unfamiliar situation for them both.

Whatever happened today, things would never be the same.

Something in Sana’s chest gave a dull twinge of pain at the thought. She couldn’t pretend that she hadn’t known exactly what it would do to them, when she’d decided to do this, but she’d hoped— Sana had hoped that it wouldn’t come to this. That she’d be able to finish it all before her old team could track her down, even knowing exactly how good they were at their jobs.

“Please go,” Sana tried, despite knowing that it was futile. “You shouldn’t be here.”

Jeongyeon shook her head, her jaw set in that stubborn way that told Sana she didn’t plan to move an inch, and she said more insistently, “Listen. It isn’t too late to stop.”

“You think so?” Sana meant to sound disbelieving, but she hated the waver in her voice that made Jeongyeon’s eyes light up with the barest glint of hope, and Sana knew Jeongyeon still thought there was truth to her words, still thought Sana could be turned from this path. “You think I’ll still be welcome, after all this?”

Jeongyeon’s gaze stayed steady. “You haven’t killed anyone.” Sana stared at her, and Jeongyeon winced before amending, “Anyone innocent.”

Of course not. Sana may have gone rogue, but she wasn’t a murderer. Sana only killed people who deserved to be killed: people who kidnapped children and planned mass bombings and killed regardless of whether the victims deserved to die. Regardless of whether they had been brave, or kind, or good; regardless of whether they left behind eight others who would spend a lifetime mourning, or a best friend who wouldn’t rest until she saw to it that every single person who’d had a hand in Momo’s death was buried six feet under.

“This wouldn’t have happened,” Sana said, “if you would just _do_ something. All of you are just sitting around like it doesn’t even matter. Like she didn’t even—”

“That isn’t fair,” Jeongyeon cut in, her expression tightening. “We’re trying. It isn’t our fault you keep killing everyone before we get to them. What do you think this is going to accomplish, Sana? You think shooting a few people will bring her back?”

Sana knew it wouldn’t. _You weren’t there_ , she wanted to say. _You weren’t the one who stumbled through the dust to find her. You didn’t know her like I did._

Instead she remained silent, and Jeongyeon sighed. “You’re not the only one who misses her,” she told Sana, and the words were gentle rather than dismissive. Then she hesitated, and Sana knew that whatever Jeongyeon said next would be— dangerous, something she wasn’t yet ready to hear, and— “Mina misses you, too.”

There it was. Jeongyeon could play on whatever attachment Sana had to the rest of the group, but when it came to Mina... Mina was different. Mina had always been different, and if there was any sentiment that could stop Sana now it would be the memory of careful hands on her scarred skin, a warm presence tucked into her side during late-night stakeouts, and a smile that had knocked Sana breathless the very first time she’d seen it on the new, unassuming agent. The first time and every time after.

“All you have to do is stop here,” Jeongyeon said. “Don’t make me bring you in.”

The man Sana had been hunting was the head of an illegal arms organization, one that provided the bombs used in the Tokyo attack six months ago, and he had probably gained a good half-mile lead on her in the time Jeongyeon had kept her here.

Mina missed her. Momo was dead.

That day, Sana left Jeongyeon in the alleyway with a bullet in her left leg. It wouldn’t kill her, but it would hurt enough for Sana to get away, and enough for things to change.

/

It had been a smart move on Jeongyeon’s part, if Sana was honest with herself, to bring up Mina. As if Sana needed any reminder of what she’d left behind. As if Sana didn’t see her everywhere, every minute, in the most insignificant things no matter how she tried to ignore them: the ketchup bottles lining a hot-dog vendor’s stand, the stalls filled with hand-crocheted bags and knitted scarves, the boy selling flowers who winked and called after her in his thick accent, _a pretty rose for a pretty girl, darling?_

The first time she called Mina that, Mina had blushed and covered her face with her hands, because of course that was the sort of thing that made Mina flustered. Never mind that they had just woken up in bed together, or the shameless way Sana was nuzzling into the bare skin beneath her collarbone.

Mina wasn’t an overly possessive lover by nature, which was good, because Sana gave affection freely. With Mina, who was subtle in the way she loved and sparingly physical, Sana was careful not to give more than she was willing to receive. But on missions, when the target was some older man who fell too easily to casual touches and stray glances, Sana doled these things out in abundance: a hand on their upper arm, a flutter of lashes. And closer to home, draping herself over a cringing Jeongyeon or an unamused Tzuyu whenever she was feeling particularly bored, or in want of meaningless contact. 

But everyone had their moments of insecurity, and that morning must have been one of them for Mina, who seemed unable to stop fidgeting restlessly under her touch.

Sana was quick to notice, pulling away to ask, “What’s on your mind?”

“Just thinking,” Mina said, and at the curious look Sana gave her she sighed and sat up against the headboard, hips shifting out from where Sana had bracketed them between her legs. “You’re out for the next two weeks, right? In, um, was it—”

“Kyoto,” Sana supplied.

“Right,” Mina said, but there was uncertainty in her tone. 

“Will you miss me that much?” Sana said, teasingly, in an effort to distract Mina from whatever it was that was turning down the corners of her lips. Poking her cheek lightly when she failed to respond. “Hmm, Mina?”

“Sa- _tang_ ,” Mina protested, batting her hands away, looking indignant when Sana only grinned down at her. “I’m only wondering why they didn’t send all three of us. It’s been a while since we went separately.”

“Well, Momo’s familiar with the region,” Sana said. “Hometown and all. Besides, we’re posing as a couple, and two girls is already unorthodox enough before you add—”

Oh. _Oh._

“Mitang.” Sana couldn’t help the way her smile was swerving into a smirk. “You’re not... _jealous_ , are you?”

Sana knew the answer already, but the way Mina flushed and avoided her gaze would’ve given her away anyway. “I’m not! I trust you, I promise I do, and I love Momo. It’s just—”

“I know,” Sana said, before Mina could try to stutter her way through an explanation. Mina wasn’t the best at expressing herself, especially not with matters of the heart, but Sana understood. Didn’t mind when Mina left things unsaid.

She did trust Sana, with her heart and with her life, and had demonstrated as much with how last week she’d leapt from the twentieth floor of a hotel without so much as a confirmation that Sana was waiting outside with the helicopter (which, of course, she had been). Mina really wasn’t jealous in the strictest sense of the word; it was more that she didn’t _know_ , and Sana knew not knowing always put her a bit off-balance.

Sana and Momo had always been something of a gray area. Jeongyeon was one of the first to point it out, _you two are touchy, huh?_ And it wasn’t just meaningless contact, not with Momo, who Sana had known before she’d known how to use a knife. 

“Mina,” Sana began seriously, “Momo and I aren’t like that. We’re only...”

It was easier to say what they weren’t than what they were. Sana loved her, but not in the way that she loved Mina, not in the way that she loved Jeongyeon or Jihyo or Tzuyu, either. Was it necessary, to put it into words? Mina and Momo could remain as separate entities in her heart, and she could love both of them equally. Equally and differently.

“I know,” Mina said, though Sana hadn’t finished her sentence, biting her lip in an embarrassed manner and wincing. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have worried."

“Darling,” Sana said, and felt a surge of fondness at the redness in Mina’s cheeks, climbing to the tips of her ears and furling down past the line of her shoulders, that made her forget about Momo for the time being, “it’s okay to worry, but I’ll just be pretending. What you and I have is real.”

That was ten months ago. Sana hasn’t seen her in five.

 _Mina misses you_ , Jeongyeon told her, before Sana shot her, and Sana had thought— _will she still? If I see her again, will it be like before, with her leaning in on the tips of her toes and her arms looped around my waist, or will it be down the barrel of a gun?_

Leaving Mina had been the hardest part. Sana had reassured herself with the thought that she could come back to her, after it was all over— a necessary tradeoff for Momo, who would never be returning. It made it easier to turn away from the hot-dog vendor, the old lady who sat behind the counter with her knitting needles, the boy with his rose and his _darling_ , when the real thing was the light at the end of the tunnel.

But things have changed now.

/

**BEIJING:**

Everything had started to go wrong with the disaster in Beijing.

(That wasn’t true. Things had started to go wrong two weeks earlier, in Tokyo, after Sana staggered out of the carnage with Momo in her arms: bloody and torn, her skin still warm to the touch. Everything had been thrown into chaos, then. The world wasn’t meant to exist without Momo in it, the little team they’d built fracturing at its foundation, and Sana had been willing to wait, to stand by and watch her friends’ valiant efforts to pull things back together from where they’d careened off-course, for all of two weeks, until her impatience finally devolved into resentment.)

Before, it had been in the little things: the shadows Sana glimpsed under her eyes in the rare moments she could bear to look in the mirror, the nights when she awoke in a cold sweat and even Mina’s soft breathing couldn’t lull her back to sleep. But in Beijing, the aftershocks of Tokyo had finally become obvious.

“Millions of yuan worth of damage,” Jihyo said, sounding more exasperated than angry. “An entire apartment complex collapsed, one that I hope you knew was vacated before you decided to start a shootout there. With no authority. What were you thinking?”

Jihyo, evidently, seemed to think that Sana hadn’t been thinking at all. For once, she was wrong. Sana had planned out every detail, down from the location— she did, of course, know that there would be no bystanders in the building— to the minute she fired the first shot. She’d had far too much time to do so after Momo’s death, between Jihyo’s promises of _soon_ and Mina’s attempts to placate her, all of it useless. All of it inaction.

Jihyo sucked in a breath and let it out slower. “Sana, I know you’re grieving. We all are.”

“Not enough to do anything about it, apparently,” Sana said before she could stop herself, and watched Jihyo’s face tumble through a series of expressions in a matter of seconds, too quickly for Sana to read any of them.

“Is that what you think?” Jihyo said. “That I want to just be stuck here, knowing that the people who killed Momo are out there somewhere and we can’t even do anything about it? There are _rules_ , Sana, and just because you were closer to her than any of us doesn’t mean you’re any exception.”

Jihyo’s words betrayed the hurt beneath her anger, the guilt and the exhaustion, and Sana thought that perhaps she had misjudged. Like everyone, Jihyo hadn’t known Momo as long as Sana and not nearly as well, but she’d still _known_ her— had tagged along with Momo and Mina and Sana to the movies the last time she’d had a free day, which wasn’t often with the paperwork she’d been swamped with ever since she’d been moved from field work to management. Had spent the entirety of two hours making faces with Momo whenever Sana and Mina did something “revoltingly cheesy” like accidentally brush fingers over the popcorn bowl.

(Except Sana knew that Momo had secretly found it endearing, that two of her closest friends could share moments like those in a world as hectic as theirs, because she confessed as much to Sana when they were waiting for Mina and Jihyo to come out of the bathroom. Sana had turned to her, surprised, when Momo slipped her arm under Sana’s and rested her chin on her shoulder in one of the rare moments she initiated such contact in public, and Momo had smiled with her eyes crinkling affectionately at the corners. Said in the earnest and honest way that was rare in their profession, but not from her, not to Sana: _sometimes I just think it’s amazing, Satang. That you and Mina found each other. That I get to see you two happy._ )

“Sana?” Jihyo said, and Sana blinked. The rigid cut of Jihyo’s jaw had relaxed during the time she’d spent in memory. “I’m sorry. That came off harsher than I intended.”

“It’s okay,” Sana said automatically.

Jihyo leaned forward in her seat. “Is it? Mina tells me you haven’t been sleeping well.”

A flicker of something hideous seethed up from her chest— Mina had been talking to Jihyo, had she, about how Sana wasn’t doing well. When on the worst days Mina could hardly string a sentence together, couldn’t even pick up a cup without shattering it against the counter, until Sana had to come sweep up the fragments and still the terrified tremor of Mina’s hands by covering them with her own. Oh, but Mina thought that _Sana_ was the one Jihyo needed to be concerned for, when she herself was—

Mina had never, not once in her life, hurt Sana intentionally. Not even back in the days they had to spar with each other for practice, when she’d spend half an hour after every session fretting over the slightest bruise that had arisen on Sana’s skin. Sana didn’t know when she’d let herself forget that. She felt appropriately disgusted with herself.

“I’m fine,” she said. “You don’t need to worry about me.”

“China’s Minister of State Security says otherwise,” Jihyo said. “And so do I. Look, I don’t expect you to be alright after what happened, and honestly? You clearly aren’t.”

Jihyo’s bluntness made her stiffen. “Jihyo, I just want—” What Sana _wanted_ was Momo back at her side like she should have been, like she’d never left. But she couldn’t have that, so Sana would have to settle for the next best thing. “I just want them to _pay_.”

“There are ways within the boundaries of what we can do,” said Jihyo.

Sana laughed. “What, we need permission now? I don’t think they bothered asking before they blew Tochō to hell.”

“It’s not just about permission,” Jihyo retorted, eyes narrowed. “You know I know that.” (Jihyo had been a bit of a wild child once, and she’d always let Sana get away with a certain degree of rule-breaking). “We can’t go around murdering people, Sana, no matter who they are. You used to know this.”

The first lesson: they’re more than just killers. Sana used to know this, among many other things. That she was born two weeks early. That a trained shooter could reload a Glock 19 in about a second. That Mina and Momo would always have her back, and Sana, in turn, would have theirs.

Jihyo was still looking at her with that subtle, calculating concern that would’ve made Sana want to break things, to smash the lamp a few inches to her right and the cup of coffee in front, had she been fifteen years younger. As it was, all she did was wait.

After a long moment, Jihyo nodded with a sort of finality. “I’m taking you out, Sana,” she said, “for your sake and for ours. I’ll let you know when you’ve been deemed safe to return to work. Tzuyu will be collecting your weapons tomorrow morning.”

Sana didn’t bother to argue. She stood with jerky movements, tasted the copper where she’d bit through her lip. Ignored Jihyo’s quiet apology to her back on the way out. Her ribcage ached dully, right under the spot where Momo’s elbow had pressed up against her skin, that day at the movie theater when they linked arms. _Sometimes I just think it’s amazing, Satang._

It was, to love in a world where nothing could last forever.

/

Sana wonders, sometimes, if Mina had known what she was going to do.

In the two weeks between Tokyo and Beijing, Mina tried to distract her. Her efforts were uncharacteristically obvious, when Sana came home from the target range to find Mina pacing the foyer, dressed in a pretty white blouse and jean shorts, and before Sana could open her mouth Mina had shoved her toward the bedroom and told her to get changed.

They went out to an arcade that day, Mina steering Sana away from all the shooting games she gravitated towards— Sana was generally uncoordinated and awful at any sort of video game, but she had tremendous amounts of training for FPS. But Mina pouted and claimed that failing was part of the _experience_ , which Sana thought was immensely hypocritical since Mina hated losing at even the most insignificant things and, by her fifth attempt, had resorted to subtly shaking the claw machine while Sana acted as lookout for any arcade employees that might have rebuked her.

Mina ended up failing a sixth time, so Sana tried and got the penguin plushie on her first. This earned her first an earful about how unfair and rigged these things were (which Sana had already guessed, based purely off the fact that Mina had actually _lost_ at a game for once), and later, after Mina had exhausted her rarely-used vocal cords, a kiss that had her blushing like a fool right by the Whack-a-Mole machine.

There were more on the cab ride home, after Sana shot the driver a look that had him obediently rolling up the partition. Mina tasted like the ice cream they’d bought with the remainder of their tickets— she’d chosen mint, Sana hated the flavor but loved Mina, and she was so pretty even in the dim glow of passing headlights, pressed up against Sana in the cramped space of the backseat, that Sana almost couldn’t stand it. Ended up pulling her in again each time they broke apart, until they were both out of breath.

Being normal was freeing, even if it was only for sporadic moments like these, and Sana really thought that was all there was to this trip out— that was, until Sana pushed open the door to their apartment and stepped over the threshold before noticing that somewhere along the way, Mina’s hand had slipped out of her grip.

She turned around to find Mina still standing in the doorway, hugging the stuffed penguin and looking forlorn.

“Mina?” she tried, at the same instant that Mina said, “I love you.”

It wasn’t the first time, but it was a rarity. Mina didn’t often express herself so directly, not in words. So Sana took hold of her arm to guide her into their home, gently, and said, “I love you too. What’s wrong, darling?”

“Everyone leaves,” Mina said. “Even the ones who promise me they won’t.”

Sana felt it like a bullet to her chest: an instant, ripping pain that left her unable to speak. They hadn’t talked about it so explicitly in all this time, Momo’s death, and to hear Mina’s grief vocalized was nearly unbearable. Sana hadn’t known every detail of their relationship separate from her, hadn’t felt it necessary when she knew both Momo and Mina so well it frightened her, sometimes, and probably frightened them more.

Well enough to tell that Momo’s death had damaged Mina nearly as badly as it had Sana. Mina had been their third on the mission that day, not in the building but on the other end of the earpiece, and now she flinched at loud noises, or just clammed up and stood there shaking, and Sana’s best efforts often did nothing for her at all.

Sana wondered when Momo had made this promise. Had it been in Berlin, when they’d been infiltrating a high-security club while Sana dealt with the mob outside? Or back in cryptography class, when they’d taken turns decoding and Sana, who had always been the worst at it, ended up watching the two of them pass indecipherable notes under her nose as she watched and whined? Or had it been more obvious, during one of Momo’s many visits to the apartment, when Sana stepped away for a second to turn on the AC?

Sana would never know. She couldn’t possibly ask Mina, who had now pressed her face into the curve of Sana’s neck, the collar of her shirt. The two of them just— standing there with the apartment door still open, Sana’s arms limp and useless at her sides until she’d finally lifted them, wrapped them around the small of Mina’s back.

If Mina had known that Sana, too, would eventually leave, she wouldn’t have let her go.

/

**TOKYO:**

“Momo!”

The ceiling was tattered, strips of plaster dangling like shredded paper. Sana’s ears were ringing so loudly that she couldn’t hear herself coughing out the dust in her lungs, nor the cracking of debris, the people that must have been screaming all around.

“Momo!”

She couldn’t hear that, either.

Ahead, there was a body on the ground.

/

Sana never did tell Mina what happened during the mission in Kyoto.

Partly because Mina hadn’t asked— probably in an effort to make up for what she surely considered a burst of immaturity and not-jealousy— and partly because there had been nothing to tell. Nothing out of the ordinary happened in Kyoto, except that Sana had been, very briefly, captured by the underlings of the dealer they were meant to kill.

Sana had been supremely unconcerned, even tied to a chair and unarmed as she was. She was right to be, too, because barely ten minutes after she came out of her chloroform-induced unconsciousness, Momo kicked down the door and shot six of the seven men dead. The last one had tried to stammer some nonsense about how his boss could pay Big Money if she spared him (which was a blatant lie, Sana knew how cheap the cost of hiring such low-ability henchmen was), and Sana couldn’t help but laugh into her gag when Momo leveled him with that trademark empty stare.

“No thanks,” said her best friend, right before she put a bullet between his eyes. “I’d rather take her.”

“You couldn’t have gotten there faster?” Sana said later, after Momo cut her free and both of them had washed the blood spatters out of their hair. It was past dusk, and the two of them were just strolling down the streets of the city. Transportation didn’t arrive for another three hours (missions with Momo ran too smoothly, they always finished earlier than the planned time even with the added delay of the kidnapping).

Momo shot her a mildly irritated look. “You’re the one that got yourself captured.”

“Actually,” Sana said, already trying not to let her laughter leak into the words, “that was only because _you_ let that guy get past you.”

“I should’ve left you there,” Momo grumbled, but Sana could tell she didn’t mean it.

“What if I _died_?”

“You wouldn’t have,” Momo said. “I got there, didn’t I?”

“Well, _who_ would buy you hotpot?” said Sana, affronted anyway. “Since you never pay.”

“Mina, probably,” Momo shrugged, keeping a straight face until Sana shoved her shoulder lightly, which was when she finally cracked a smile.

“So it’s true! You’re not denying it.”

It was a running joke among the three of them. Sana and Momo had been the ones to take Mina under their wing, when she’d joined the group after everyone had already formed their own little circles, and Mina denied it fervently but Sana was convinced that Mina had liked Momo more at first. It was easy to become Sana’s friend, but Sana kept most of her friends at arms’ distance. Momo did not. Momo was shy but also open when she wanted to be, and she liked Mina, so Mina, naturally, liked her too.

“Sana,” Momo said, so seriously that Sana turned to her. “Do you want me to?”

The first time Sana killed someone, Momo, who had done it months before, was the only one not to offer her the same hollow congratulations the others had. They were too young to live alone yet, so all of them stayed in the same dorm, and Sana woke in the middle of the night to Momo crawling under her covers, warm breath tickling behind her ear. Momo only told her to go back to sleep, and Sana had wondered why she’d even come, but the next morning Momo was still there: drooling on her pillow, hair mussed, an arm thrown haphazardly over her side.

In Kyoto, Momo’s expression was difficult to make out, under the soft glow of neon shop signs and streetlights. Sana didn’t need her to, not really, but Momo tugged on her sleeve until she stopped walking and said, “I like Mitang, Sana. But I like you most.”

They came back from Kyoto, rested, and went on another mission with Mina the week after. Sana complained to Mina several times during that trip about how Momo had practically _confessed_ to only keeping her around for the hot-pot, and Mina laughed and suggested that maybe it was time for Momo to start paying.

Momo smiled and said nothing, and neither did Sana.

/

“Sana!”

She turns.

There’s a rush of familiarity, an instant of recognition. Sana has not forgotten her, in the months they’ve been apart. Could not have, for years to come.

Mina.

Standing in the center of the roof, outlined against the skyline, the wind whipping her hair around her face. It’s shorter than it had been the last time Sana had seen her, which was in the dead of night after Jihyo had officially revoked her license to kill. Mina’s face was so unguarded in sleep, so peaceful and so beautiful, and Sana felt the tears gather behind her eyes, hot and unwelcome and threatening to spill over, and instead of kissing her goodbye Sana’d simply cradled the crook of her jaw in one hand. Pressed in lightly to feel Mina’s pulse thrumming steady under her trembling fingers, an assurance of life.

That same feeling of loss is rising in her lungs now, even though Sana has nowhere to go this time. She can’t bear to look at Mina any longer, tears her gaze away to watch the passing of clouds across the sky, and says, “I didn’t think you would come.”

“I’m sorry it took me so long,” Mina says, and she sounds the same. Of course she does. Voices aren’t like seasons, aren’t like the now-auburn leaves of the trees on the street below, the brief and brilliant blaze of the summer sun in Istanbul, or the freshly-fallen snow that had coated the slanted rooftops of the farms in Bavaria where Mina had first taken Sana’s hand in her own, on their first mission alone, at a time when they would have been put to better use wielding a knife, or a pistol. But Sana had forgone such violent methods in favor of preserving the fragile pink that had crept into Mina’s cheeks.

Voices don’t change in a matter of months, do not come and go even when Sana runs and runs. Mina has found her as she was always bound to do, and she sounds the same.

“I didn’t want you to come,” Sana admits. “I didn’t want you to—” To stop me. To take me home. To see me this way, so desperate that even I feel ashamed of it sometimes, when I’m washing my hands in the bathroom sink and watching the water change color.

“Well, I’m here,” Mina says, when Sana fails to continue. “What happens now?”

“It depends on what you’re here for.”

“I’m—” Mina falters. Sana can see it without seeing it, the way Mina is undoubtedly clenching her hands around the hem of her jacket, fingers curled into the fabric. “Satang, won’t you look at me?”

Sana does.

“They wanted to send Nayeon,” Mina tells her, and Sana finally notices the exhausted defeat that’s weighing down her shoulders and the corners of her lips, smothering the bright eagerness in her eyes Sana has grown accustomed to seeing, because back then Mina had always loved the thrill of missions. “It was this or lose you.”

Nayeon, whose relationship with Sana had only ever been tenuous at best, Momo bridging the gap between them because— well, everyone was fond of Momo. Perhaps they could have been closer friends, given time, but then Tokyo happened, and whatever possibility might have existed had been irrevocably lost. And the events of Istanbul meant that Nayeon would never forgive her, even with Jeongyeon’s wound long-healed. Even if Momo had still been here.

“I didn’t want to lose you,” Mina says. “Not you too, not after Momo.” She doesn’t edge around the name the same way she used to, the same way Jeongyeon had.

“You wouldn’t,” Sana breathes, but Mina doesn’t seem to hear. That, or she pretends not to, choosing instead to approach with quick, determined strides until she’s only a few feet away from Sana.

Mina doesn’t spare a glance to the gun in her hands, even though she must know what Sana did to Jeongyeon. Isn’t it insanity, to still trust Sana? Or does she know, even after everything, that Sana would never harm her? Even if she had been farther gone— even if Mina found her too late, and Sana was already wild-eyed and adrift, standing in the midst of a ruined world.

She’s close enough that Sana can see the details she knows so intimately: the tiny beauty mark on the bridge of her nose, the water brimming in the corners of her eyes, the tremble of her lower lip when she says, “It’s starting to feel like I already have.”

Sana doesn’t know who moves first. What she knows is that Mina’s name wrenches its way out of her chest, rough and imploring as she surges to her feet, the gun clattering onto the cement; and Mina surrenders words entirely to step forward and fling her arms around Sana, and then it’s just— 

Mina’s breath smells like mint. It’s the oddest thing to notice, here, with a Glock 19 discarded at her feet, the ridges of what is probably Mina’s backup knife pressing into Sana’s thigh, the target still in the apartment building across the street. Mina used to bring a tin of Altoids on every single one of their missions, claiming the flights made her breath sour, rolling her eyes at Sana’s playful jabs. Sana hates mint.

Sana loves her.

“I shouldn’t have left you,” Sana says, the words tumbling from her, no longer restrained by distance and focus and the single-minded intent of the hunt. “I should have taken you with me, I should have—”

“You should have _stayed_ ,” Mina says, and she’s tugging lightly on Sana’s hair, tilting her chin up from where Sana had buried it in her jacket so their eyes meet. There’s tears trailing down her cheeks. Sana had once promised herself that she’d protect this girl, when they’d first been assigned as partners, and when they became more, nothing had changed except that Sana had become wary of hurting her, too. Of making her cry.

“I’m sorry,” Sana says. Straightens and cups Mina’s face in her hands, wipes away the tears with her thumb. “Mina, darling. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Mina says. “It isn’t too late.”

It’s sudden, how Sana stiffens. Mina catches her hand before she can move it away, slots her fingers between Sana’s own and keeps it on her cheek. “The man, the target—”

“Tzuyu will take care of it,” Mina says quickly. “Please, just let her. You don’t have to keep doing this on your own.”

Sana looks at her, at their joined hands and the wide, pleading set of her eyes. Wonders why her vision is blurring at the edges. “I didn’t mean— I just miss her, Mina.”

“I know,” says Mina, and there’s the difference, that she lets it go unspoken, what everyone else has reminded Sana. That they all lost someone that day. That Sana isn’t the only one who feels this gaping, tearing absence in her heart. “It’s okay to cry.”

Sana hasn’t mourned, in all this time. But when Mina brushes the hair back from out of her eyes, pressing her lips to the crown of Sana’s head, Sana gives in. Cries, for Momo, gasping out sobs into the space between them. It’s pitiful, truly. It’s miserable and _sad_. This story is a goddamn tragedy, but it doesn’t have to end as one.

Mina soothes her, hands listing down her face, fisting themselves in Sana’s coat to draw her closer. After all this time apart, the proximity is dizzying. “Come home,” she says, and rests her forehead against Sana’s. “We can fix this.”

Sana breathes in. It’s a beautiful, windy day; the sun is just coming down over the horizon now, casting pinks and purples onto an otherwise solid blue. Tomorrow it will rise again, as it always does. Tomorrow will be a new beginning.

She nods.

The smile that blooms across Mina’s face is radiant, steals her breath away as it always has, and Sana takes in the sight that she’s kept from herself for so long. Keeps looking even as Mina leans in and kisses her.

Today the sun sets on the two of them, standing together on a rooftop in Seoul.

Tomorrow, Sana goes home.

/

Sana’s greatest regrets have nothing to do with the people who died by her hand. She finds them more in the way that Jeongyeon won’t look at her in the eye for months (though this fades, over time), and the way that Nayeon meets her every glance with a frigid glare that makes Sana look away first (this does not).

Jihyo, at least, retained some amount of trust in Sana that she may not have deserved but was grateful for. Nayeon had nearly torn up her office after she told them her decision to send Sana to Tokyo, under Mina’s supervision, and might have done much worse had it not been for Mina’s pleas. Nayeon always had a soft spot for the younger woman, as all of them do, and Sana may owe her life to it.

Sana can understand. If it had been Mina, left helpless in an alleyway to bleed out—

She and Nayeon aren’t so different, really.

/

What would have changed, if Mina had died that day instead of Momo?

Sana thinks it might have been easier— not because losing Mina would have hurt any less, not at all, but because of the simple certainty that Momo would have gone with her. Momo had avoided answering her after she’d rescued Sana in Kyoto, but Sana likes to think she knew her well enough to know how she’d react to death. Momo would have grieved with the rest, but she also would have seen the rage searing at Sana from the inside. She would have gone with Sana, if only to keep her from burning out completely. To keep her from being alone.

Sana doesn’t know if things would have ended differently, though. Because Mina— Mina may have let Sana go, but she also brought her back. Momo wouldn’t have needed to, but at the same time Sana doesn’t know if she could have.

After Sana, it was Mina who took Momo’s death the hardest. Sana left her to deal with that trauma alone. But even then...

For all that Sana wanted to protect her, wanted never to hurt her and failed, Mina was stronger when it mattered. Mina fought back the specters of friends she couldn’t save, cleaned up the glass on the kitchen tile, and steadied her hands long enough to bring Sana home.

/

It begins and ends in Tokyo.

In between, there was Beijing, and Istanbul, and Seoul. But Tokyo was where Sana lost Momo, and herself in the process. Sana does not find herself in Tokyo. Mina finds her in Seoul, takes her back and tends to her wounds. They go to Tokyo together.

It began here, with an explosion. A hundred deaths: ambassadors, secretaries, senators. The least important of them a member of the security detail, one Hirai Momo, who’d had no connection to the world outside of eight women who would spend a lifetime mourning, and a best friend who wouldn’t rest until she saw to it that every single person who’d had a hand in Momo’s death was brought to justice.

It ends here, with Sana standing over the man who’d murdered them all by the press of a button, a simple command. It would be just as easy to end his life by the pull of a trigger. A clean shot.

The man is crazed. He seems to crave death, spits as much up at her. _You want revenge, don’t you? What’s taking so long?_

What Sana wanted, all this time, is something she’ll never have again. Revenge is intangible and temporary, satisfying only in the moment, and could never truly have taken its place in the empty space by her right side where Momo belonged.

Sana can’t say she doesn’t think about it. She does. She’s killed so many that all he’d be is another tally on an endless list, and his death, unlike all the ones he’s caused, would hardly be a loss for the world.

But Sana doesn’t even have to look to know that Mina is there, standing on her left as she always has, fingers tangled with Sana’s. _Don’t_ , she says, and Sana can breathe again.

The man dies, but not by her hand. He bites into a cyanide pill buried somewhere in the back of his mouth before they can take him in and goes, just like that, alone.

/

It is an amazing and destructive thing, to love in a world where nothing lasts forever.

People lose their minds, sometimes, for the things they love. Some forms of this insanity are nobler than others. In Tokyo, a terrorist died a pathetic, terrible death, twitching to eventual stillness in a muddy ditch by the side of the road. In Beijing, Sana sent an apartment building crumbling down; in Istanbul, she shot a friend.

In Seoul, Mina found her and told her, _come home._

And Sana has.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!
> 
> twitter: @[longlive_mn](https://twitter.com/longlive_mn)


End file.
